Post navigation

12 Days of Blogmas: Unmemories

Hello! The above photo of moi features a typical expression of “huh?’ although the mouse lady and Santa were not the typical companions. Anyway we’re back with the 12 Days of Blogmas and truth be told I don’t remember the above brunch with Santa and his rodent gal pal. Truth is there is a lot I don’t remember. And that’s what today’s trip down blog lane is all about.

I wrote Unmemories, Like the Corners of My Mind last February. It started out to be sort of a humorous tribute to all the things I didn’t remember due to blackouts caused by drinking. I had an idea of writing an un-memoir. I explained the contents of my unmemoir like this:

” My unmemoir would have lots of half stories. Beginnings or just endings. Rarely would the middle of the story show up,” I wrote. “Mainly because in the middle of the action is where I would totally blackout. It became normal, for years at a time, for people to say to me matter of fact, ‘You probably don’t remember. You were really drunk.’ Like it was some kind of acceptable handicap. Like being a blackout drunk excused me from acting like a human being. But really being a blackout drunk doesn’t get you a special parking space and doesn’t entitle you to a telethon. The only perk is that people will let you off the hook for not remembering things and quietly pity you.”

The post turned out to be heavier than I had intended. Really looking at what drinking did to me and then writing about it was personally a game-changing experience for doing this blog. This post stared back at me in black and white with the truth. Not a pretty truth but one just the same. It became a goal of mine to hit that mark whenever I could. And I’m thrilled to say, as a writer, I feel like I have, a couple of times over the last year.